Container Top
Homes   Jobs   Cars   Shopping
Search

Events Calendar

EVENT SEARCH:

In This Section


Most Read Stories


Blogs:


Pets:
Sunburn in canines and felines

The Heldenfiles:
Monday Notebook, New "90210" on DVD

Patrick McManamon:
Another NBA free agent goes to a Cavs competitor

Akron Zips:
Opponent outlook: Northern Illinois

Browns Bulletin:
Single-game ticket sales begin July 11

Tribe Matters:
Shapiro fights to maintain normalcy

Cleveland Browns:
Stallworth test showed marijuana

Kent State Sports:
Men's Basketball Scheduling update

Cleveland Cavaliers:
Free agency: Another One Bites the Dust

All Da King's Men:
The Obligatory Palin Post

Blog of Mass Destruction:
The "Limbaugh Babies"

Akron Law Café:
The Veil and the Burqa – Constitutional to Ban or Restrict?

Varsity Letters:
Solon’s Baldwin could decide soon

See Jane Style:
Picnic Wear

Car Chase:
Where do We Go from Here?

Let's Talk Real Estate:
ID My Bug

Ohio Travels with Betty:
Jennifer inquires about a bus tour to Atlantic City

Sound Check:
Rundgren fans rejoice!: Second night of AWATS at The Civic added

HRLite House:
Morscruethal Behaviors or Just Lip Service?

Akron Gamer:
Hot link: Best of Nintendo at E3

Computer among utility hogs

By Mary Beth Breckinridge
Beacon Journal home writer

Some of the biggest energy hogs in your home may surprise you.

They're things like your computer and its wireless router, your brand-new flat-panel TV and even the digital picture frame you got for Christmas.

When it comes to electricity, they're insatiable. Some gobble quickly; others graze all day long.

These plug-in devices are responsible for a dramatic growth in energy demand, said Tom Reddoch, director of energy utilization for the Electric Power Research Institute, a nonprofit organization that conducts research and development for the electric power industry. The most insidious among them are the devices that stay on all the time, so that even if they don't use a great deal of power at any one moment, their use over time piles up.

What's ironic, Reddoch said, is that this growth in demand happened while huge strides were being made in improving the efficiency of the five biggest home-energy users: refrigeration, heating, cooling, lighting and water heating. While we were focused on those areas, the others sneaked up on us.

Reddoch had his own rude awakening when he put some water features in his backyard. When he measured, he discovered that the pump motors were using 48, 52 and 65 watts, and they were running 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Altogether, they were using 1,445 kilowatt-hours a year — more than enough to power two good-size Energy Star refrigerators.

Take a look at some of the devices many of us have in our homes:

• An 8-inch digital picture frame uses about 90 kwh a year.

• A cable converter box uses about 265 kwh a year. Add more functions like recording, and the usage can go up to 430 kwh.

• A 42-inch plasma TV uses about 500 kwh a year if it operates 51/2 hours a day — about 21/2 times the power required by a 27-inch set with a cathode-ray tube. An LCD TV uses about twice as much as the old-fashioned set.

• An Xbox video game system uses about 220 kwh a year if it operates three hours a day.

At roughly 10 cents a kilowatt-hour, those aren't huge expenses individually. But add everything up, and both the cost and the energy use mount, Reddoch pointed out.

What's more, use of plug-in devices continues to grow. Clay Perry, a spokesman for the institute, noted that in 1970 the average American home had three or four devices it kept plugged in all the time — a TV set, a refrigerator, maybe an electric alarm clock or a freezer. Today the average is 26.

''We really need to recognize what we're doing'' and be better stewards of energy, Reddoch said. ''We're not promoting abstinence. . . . We're promoting prudence.''

— Mary Beth Breckenridge

Some of the biggest energy hogs in your home may surprise you.

Get the full article here.


Story tools

Email  Email   Print  Print   Save  Save   Reprint  Reprint   Popular  Most Popular   Reprint  Subscribe

Share this story

AddThis Social Bookmark Button
















Most Commented Stories